allways // entry seven

entry seven

THE END / ENUF IS ENUF

Well, this is it. Just like the day that I graciously received my advance copy of Tom’s Crossing, this, too, was one shrouded in rain and the aftershocks of beautiful storms. [1]

I will do my best to keep my personal writing and recent activities separate from this final block of my "review." In re-reading some of these entries, I acknowledge that I repeat themes and ideas, but that’s because they stuck with me throughout the entire reading. I realize now that this isn't quite a review, like something to be simply left with a star-rating a few pixels removed from an "add to cart" button. Much like House of Leaves and Tom’s Crossing are much more than books. Much like how The Familiar is much more than a limited series that was prematurely cancelled due to a lack of interest.

Early on, I had thought aloud about that popular quote regarding House of Leaves, how it's a love story under the guise of a haunted house tale. By my own doing, I was stuck firmly on the track of making the comparison, an updated metaphor for usage of the story told within Tom’s Crossing. I'm not sure if there is a one-for-one version of that comparison available here. At its core, you might be able to say that it's a love story disguised as a Western. But from the Forward on, it says that this is a ghost story, with one of the main characters being just that: a literal ghost. This isn't MZD riffing on the things that made his work popular. I think that this concept of love, multi-faceted and in different forms, is simply integral to his writing. As I found myself in the wake of the action-heavy climax, I couldn't help but think about all of his other stories that made me a fan in the first place. [2]

Without getting into the narrative "whys" and who is narrating and how the information is available, the format of the text is as follows: the story has been told as an oral history, but with the air of an epic storyteller or historian. There's a knowing intelligence to the speaker, but it never adheres itself to any of the main characters. It removes itself from any potential biases by never getting you caught up on whose speaking. As previously mentioned, you must take the story at face value, allowing yourself to be as influenced (or not) by the varied opinions that the narrator frequently references.

These references are mostly the conversations of people you do not know (and may never). Within the world of the story they seem to be MZD's narrative equivalent of the footnotes and formatting of House of Leaves. Tom’s Crossing is very much alike in that regard, moreso putting a world before you, as well as multiple points of view, opinions, and sources of unreliability... instead of a simple A-to-Z story about a haunted house or a journey across a mountain range.

I started this project thinking of something like “art taking on a life of its own,” and its bastardization, “life taking on an art of its own.” Whether by coincidence, synchronicity, or pure dumb luck, I don’t think I could have summed up my final feelings on the story any better. It's simple but overwhelming, simultaneously.

Tom’s Crossing tells the story about a boy taking two horses on a journey that will hopefully set them free, avoiding the slaughterhouse that awaits them. But what unfolds is layered in local politics, shady business dealings, family rivalries, religious criticism, "untrue" crime, Western folklore, elements of the supernatural, and fantastic whimsy... all of these things, are further discussed and pulled in multiple directions by countless fellow spectators and infinite voices.

The scope creeps up on you.

Without further specific examples, I previously noted that this story takes place in the 1980s and we assume all of the modern day reflections and external commentary to be contemporary. But this is strained as the dates referenced become more and more present, slowly and suddenly referenced as in the future and further away from our actual modern date of 2025. I felt myself lost within the story, wondering where (and when) it was that this speaker was retelling this story from. That got me thinking... How many of these minor characters, whom we know only through their opinions on this folklore, have already passed away? This line of thinking is addressed and hits powerfully as the story goes on. It’s chilling… but also melancholy.

I felt an awesome, artistic symmetry as we rolled into the final chapters. From the very beginning of the story, the narrator remarks how many vivid images from the actual story were later captured in an artistic lens, whether through charcoal or watercolors or oil on canvas... At first, I was not sure how (or if) these even tied into the story at all. But we eventually get some insight on these artistic works and how they came to be and who their creators actually are.

I couldn't help but remember one of my earliest posts in this process, about the so-called "giant circle stamp method" and was caught incredibly off-guard and even a bit frustrated, when I had to experience it firsthand. But the payoff was an emotional one. After an intense rising action that we are all led to anticipate and fear finally crescendoes into the climatic confrontation between significant characters and we're in a page-turning volley of action, it.... steps back. Meandering about art and art galleries. I was stunned. I wanted to get back to the action. But I started picking up what MZD was putting down and getting caught up in the narrative about a particular art installation. My mind was blown and my heart was a little broken... only to then be thrown back into the story, picking up where we needed to be. [3]

Tom’s Crossing is a whirlwind. Some may find certain portions, linguistics, and stylistic choices unappealing (such as the detours noted above), but I finished this nearly 1,300 page book in under a month and loved every moment of it. In recent years, I’ve been spoiled with the ease of reading on a Kindle and couldn’t fathom reading such a tome in paperback, but here we are. I exhausted an entire highlighter going through the book, noting quotes that spoke to me and what I assumed to be references to other works in MZD’s pantheon. If you enjoyed House of Leaves or The Familiar or any other of his stories, Tom’s Crossing is a must-read. Just look at the journey it took me on.

The best stories remain with you, following as ghosts. It is unavoidable, so you might as well single out this far-reaching epic as the next spectre to haunt you. It will always be there by your side, silent and unknowable, but nonetheless, a beloved and comforting companion. [4]

There we have it. Enuf is enuf.

End Notes

Cameron stated, in not so many words, that he could not or would not help me in this situation. We both expressed how nice it was to hear from one another, but he was now states away with a job that woke him before dawn. I was still, more or less, back home, with an office job and too much time on my hands after the regular close of business hours. He could tell that there was something up about this whole thing, the urgency in which I had sprung it on him once we started talking, but nonetheless tried to end the conversation not that long after. Do you know those old friends you have, the ones that you used to talk to almost every day of your young life, but at some point, that goes away, and so does their light from your life? There was no falling out or dramatic implosion, you just started drifting in opposite directions? Sometimes geography got in the way, it's not as if you'd run into them at the store anymore, they just slowly became strangers and you had to sit with the consideration that, maybe, if you had never known each other in the first place, the circumstances of the present day would only ever allow you two to exist as strangers, that if you had never met each other as younger souls you could only ever exist as a vague thought on the other side of the world and never crossing paths? You might text them at holidays, then birthdays, then you get to the point that when you scroll back up and see the previous messages you had shared were simply, bluntly, last year's birthday wishes? And even then, those start dripping away, too.

He was trying to gently end the conversation, having wholly created a life separate and away from that day on the hillside, the one that I had only recently, but fervently, latched onto.

Before he ended the conversation though, he did recommend I look for any parks around the old highway, and that I should look into a metal detector. "Maybe the gallows or a coffin or whatever might have some pieces of ironwork on it. Old rusty nails or something. Couldn't hurt!"

After he had "left," a realization struck me. Had he (and Jamie?) ever tried this search before? Perhaps when Jamie had checked in on social media? Or were they just intelligent recommendations from an outdoorsy type. The conversation had ended though and I feared that any immediate follow-up would only serve as an irritation, so I let it sit. My uncle was an avid metal detector and I'd just ask him to borrow his for the weekend. As shockingly and deeply as this adventure had stricken me, I did, afterall, have that office job I spoke of. This final search would have to wait one business week, until I was free again on Saturday morning. Searching the map once again, I found "Long Bridge Park" off of the Marne Highway and could only wonder, would a park with such a name possibly hold a body or the detritus of a long-since-detereoriated gallows? Maybe it would, who the hell knows.

Saturday morning came. The weekend was a washout, heavy rains on both days. But I couldn't wait another week and I would get some sort of citation or even be arrested for showing up late at night on a Monday. So I was at the park before ten am on a Saturday. I wore a rain poncho and wielded my uncle's metal detector, wrapped in plastic in order to protect it from the elements.

When I was about twenty minutes on the official walking path, I looked down at the GPS map on my phone and thought for the second, "what in the fuck am I doing?" I don't know a thing about historical tracking or archaeology nor do I have any basis for whatever the hell it is I was looking for. Did I expect to find some pristine wooden structure deep in the woods, decayed only in the sense that rich, vibrant moss was growing along its sides?

There was a moment of deja vu when I came to a bend in the walking path. The paved road gently curved to the left, but there was a muddy descent off to the right, an old foot path leading into the treeline. I followed it.

Another few feet in, the ground had disappeared, with only a body of water of indeterminate depth, slick and coated in a thick layer of moss. It was not what I had imagined when I envisioned the gallows, it was a gross slime. I was stepping into a literal swamp. But I was this deep already, and my boots were already submerged, so I kept going. I pocketed my phone and kept the metal detector up high and away from the ankle-deep water. This wasn't my property so I was ultra-cautious with it. I had no idea how much these things cost. I wasn't about to be out $500 for whatever the hell it was that I was doing.

I'm not sure how long I walked into that swamp. Eventually the water gave way to spongy, soft land, likewise coated in almost neon-green vegetation. The skies were gray and void above the treetops and the rain did not let up for a moment. It was gorgeous, but I was getting cold. Now that I was firmly on land, however unfirm it was, I began sweeping with the metal detector.

Thoughts about Jamie and Cameron and the rest of the carpool gang came back. I thought about other friends that I really should do a better job of keeping up with. Like the Risoldi twins. My brother's little group of classmates. My creative partners over the years. The kid from across the street who I grew up with. They were all just stories now, stories that I kept close to my heart, but I would never have any idea how significant, if at all, I was in their own journey unless I became present once again. Maybe that's the resolution to all of my thinking about Jamie and Cameron these last few weeks. They kept their stories varied, and even if not incredibly exciting, they were fulfilling. Cameron had his family and a nice piece of property. Poor Jamie was dead, but even a decade out of school, he made people laugh and was a fixture at community events. Always the class clown, but never mean spirited. We needed more people like that in the world. Making a home, and being content with it. Finding a community, and making it laugh. Perhaps I had avoided both of these things for too long.

Then the metal detector squawked alive. There was something in the ground. A testament to how ill-equipped I was for an undertaking like this, I took out the small garden spade I had brought for this venture. I gently leaned the metal detector between a log and tree, as off of the moss as I could manage, and started digging in the wet ground.

I didn't find a gallows. I didn't find the body of the murderer, Jamie Clough, but I did find something, which I'll share in the appendix. What it all means, how it got here, how I got here, I haven't a clue. Sometimes you'll get a million of answers, but not have the faintest semblance of the right question.

The rain won’t let up until Tuesday of next week, but it’s alright. Beautiful, even. I’ve a lot to think about as it is. People who matter to me, people who have gone on, some others who haven’t heard my name in years, and- and isn’t it still something wonderful to remember them, to feel their love, even if it’s been long since lost? Nonetheless, I suspect that the happy memory of rain doesn’t do much to sate the barren ground. I will resolve that. For now though, let me enjoy the gentle storm.

It's still falling on my house, the one that I promise now, and promise allways, to make a home.

Field Notes // House Fragments